


Worth the Climb

by Myx



Category: Cabin Pressure
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff, Gen, Kid Arthur, Kid Fic, Sledding, Winter, fandot summer christmas, kid martin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-14
Updated: 2017-07-14
Packaged: 2018-12-02 00:55:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11498403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Myx/pseuds/Myx
Summary: Kid!Martin meets kid!Arthur while on a hill. Fluffy times ensue.





	Worth the Climb

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own anything. 
> 
> Written for 2017 Fandot Summer Christmas.

“Martin, please stay close to where I’ll be reading; there’s a lot of people out here and I don’t want to lose you.” Wendy called out to Martin, who was holding onto his bulky and rather odd shaped sled, and running towards a hill.

“Don’t worry, mum! You’ll be able to see me! I promise I’ll just go up and down this hill; it'll be a great hill for me to try out my newly improved sled.” Martin called back to his mum.

Martin was elated that he was able to go outside and play in the snow and was really looking forward to being able to finally get enough air to leave the ground, so he could pretend, if only for a few seconds, that he was _actually_  flying. As he ran up the hill, he noticed a boy, a few years younger than he was, pulling a sled, and looking back on it every once in a while, almost like the boy was talking to someone on the empty sled. Martin slowed down and approached the boy carefully, so he wouldn’t startle him. The boy, almost as if he was sensing someone coming up to him, spoke first.

“Hi!” the boy began, “I’m Arthur and I just turned 7. This,” Arthur referenced the empty sled, “is Jack, the polar bear cub from the planet Malnack. Who are you?”

Martin stared at the boy with a confused look. He wasn’t sure how to peruse this situation, even though, he was _quite_ guilty of having his own imaginary friends (even if they weren’t from wherever the heck Malnack was located), but he knew there was no way he could make fun of this poor kid; he seemed like the type of kid who often got made fun of while at school. “I’m Martin and I’m visiting Fitton for Christmas with my mum, dad, and my two siblings. I’m 10 years old and this,” he paused, and held up his sled for Arthur to look at it, “is my sled that I sometimes wished was a plane, instead of me just pretending it were a plane.”

“It really does look like a plane, though. I like that you have small, cardboard wings attached to it, though they are a bit crooked.” Arthur paused, and thought for a moment before continuing. “But, them being crooked makes the plane have more of a brilliant look; it is better than them being perfect. I take it you really like planes?” He smiled wide, eyes shining.

“Yeah, ever since I was six, I’ve loved everything about aviation. I’m going to be a pilot; well, maybe not _now,_ but I will be, when I grow up.” Martin puffed out his chest, appearing quite proud of rather his bold statement.

“That’s brilliant! My dad is a pilot, and while he takes me on flights, sometimes I am not allowed in the flight deck with him because I ask too many questions. Questions that I should already know, even if I am _only_ seven.” Arthur’s face clouded and his gap-toothed smile disappeared completely.

Martin was lost on what to do; he didn’t think picking up Arthur and swinging him around like an airplane, like Simon-for whatever silly reason-would do to Martin regardless of how Martin felt, so he just gave Arthur a (hopefully) encouraging (and hopefully not too awkward) smile to help lessen the pain from his obviously quite dreadful father. “I promise you that I won’t be a pilot like your dad is; I’ll be a helpful and nice one-you have my promise on that, Arthur. Would you like to go sledding with me? Assuming, of course, that’s alright with Jack.”

Arthur looked at Jack the polar bear, nodded at the sled, and then said to Martin, “Yes! We would love that. There’s this brilliant spot that we found that is perfect! Follow us, Martin and we’ll lead you to it.”

Martin followed Arthur the rest of the way up the hill and found his perfect spot. Arthur wasn’t lying; it _really_ was quite perfect; there weren’t any trees that you could run into or scrape yourself on, and the snow was fresh; not many people had been down this way. The boys played for quite some time until it got dark and Martin told Arthur that he would certainly see him again (though Martin was sure he would never see him again), after giving him a hug, and giving Jack an affectionate pat on the 'head.'

* * *

 

“Well, welcome to MJN Air, Martin. We'll fill out your paperwork later, but before that, I suppose you’ll want to meet the rest of the team, right?” Carolyn asked Martin.

“Right, please, lead the way.” Martin followed Carolyn out of her office in Fitton Airfield, out the door leading onto the runway, and opened the door to an older and certainly well-used plane, which Martin assumed was GERT-I.

Carolyn gestured to an older, tall man with greying hair who gave off a rather suave vibe. “This is Douglas, who will be your First Officer.”

Douglas shook Martin’s hand, and gave him a polite smile.

“And this,” she began, gesturing to a man in his late 20s with brown hair, and (as Martin noted to himself) quite mesmerizing eyes, “is my son, Arthur, who is the steward of the airplane.”

“Hiya, Martin; it has been a while, hasn’t it?” Arthur asked, shaking Martin’s hand with a surprisingly firm grip.

Martin’s blue-green eyes widen as he remembered that day on that hill, all those years ago. “It is good to see you again, Arthur. I _finally_ became a pilot, like I said I would be.”

Carolyn and Douglas, sensing that this could potentially be quite a long conversation, left GERT-I.

“That’s brilliant, Skip! Wait, it is okay that I call you that, right?”

Martin flushed a beautiful shade red that matched his hair and made his freckles that dotted his cheeks stand out. “Yes, Arthur, that is per-perfectly okay for you to call me that. I _am_ the Captain, after all.”

“Good. I’ll be calling you by that name a lot, Skip. You deserve it because you _earned_ it. You weren’t handed it; you probably fought really, _really_ hard for it, and what you had to do to achieve this might not have been terribly brilliant, but it _is_ brilliant that you’re here. I thought I was never going to see you again; no one wanted to play with me when I was a kid because I was always so eccentric. But you did, which was really brilliant.” Arthur walked over to Martin and gave him a hug. “Do you still have that sled? I would _love_ to go sledding again, especially since there’s snow on the ground! And that hill is still perfect, even after all this time.”

Martin wrapped his arms around Arthur, taking in the lingering scent of the shampoo that he had used, and felt at peace. While he didn’t feel like he was 10 years old again, he internally cheered for (and thanked) his 10 year-old self who noticed the boy who was sledding by himself, and _actually_ approached him, instead of just thinking the boy was a weirdo, because there’s no way that this event, fifteen or so years later, could have actually occurred. But, here Martin was, hugging that very same boy, now an adult, with the mesmerizing eyes that the adult Martin could certainly find himself getting lost in, and who made Martin blush something fierce just by calling him “Skip.”


End file.
